Well after counting down the days, the time has finally arrived for restaurants to start taking their Winterlicious bookings… and I’m VERY excited. For those of you that may not be familiar with Winterlicious, it is a yearly occurrence in the Toronto food scene where participating restaurants offer a prix fixe menu for a period of approximately two weeks. I love being able to dine out during this time, as it allows me to take in the breathtaking atmospheres and indulge in some of the fabulous foods on offer at many of the finest restaurants in the city. So far, I’ve been able to make four different reservations… so I can pretty much guarantee that there will be a great deal of indulging happening this year. I will try my best to post a review for each restaurant I visit so stay tuned. In the meantime, I’d love to share my restaurant review for Antler. It doesn’t appear to be participating in Winterlicious, yet I highly recommend dining there if you get a chance. Enjoy. Restaurant Review: Antler Peter Patlakas Defining Canadian cuisine can prove to be somewhat challenging in comparison to the cuisine of other cultures, such as Italian or Chinese. One might describe a typical Canadian dish to consist of a burger grilled on a barbeque with a side of fries or poutine. Our American neighbours to the south may perceive that we live in igloos, yet they easily forget that Canada is comprised of much more than snow and ice. According to Natural Resources Canada (2016), Canada has 347 million hectares of forests which amounts to approximately 9% of the world’s forests. Canadian Chef Michael Hunter, former Executive Chef of Reds (ChefDB, 2015) in Toronto, has made it his mission to showcase wild regional ingredients in an attempt to define true Canadian cuisine at his newly opened restaurant, Antler, in Toronto. On the menu are various wild game meats, including deer and wild boar, accompanied by regional and seasonal ingredients. After dining at Antler, one can easily say that Chef Hunter’s mission is complete. Antler is located at 1454 Dundas Street West, a neighbourhood that has recently seen the opening of many new restaurants. Chef Hunter’s restaurant is small and cozy, so I would advise that you definitely ensure you make a reservation either by calling them at (647) 345-8300 or through their website at antlerkitchenbar.com. I reserved my table through their website and was pleased to see that they offer a space to write a note, which is great if you want to inform them that you are celebrating a special occasion or that you have a serious allergy they should be aware of. After booking my reservation, I was pleasantly surprised to get a phone call from one of their staff members the next day confirming my reservation. They said they were looking forward to having me, showing that they value my business and making for a great first impression. Upon my arrival, we were able to find ample metered street parking. We were promptly greeted by the hostess once we entered the restaurant and my party of three was immediately seated at a reserved table near the back, just in front of the bar. We were provided with menus printed on paper, making them much more sanitary than traditional laminated ones. Our table was clean, with a simple knife and fork placed on a cloth napkin for each diner and a tea light situated in a mason jar filled with dark blue-black pebbles in the centre of the table. After a few minutes of being seated, a server came and informed us about the daily specials. When we asked her about the price, she said that she did not know and that she would go check for us before asking if we wanted to order drinks. Antler’s drink menu consists of a small assortment of wines available by the glass or bottle. The price point for the wine was well matched to that of the food, ranging from an affordable $10 glass of Jean Luc Colombo Viognier French white to a pricey Collemattoni Brunelle di Montalcino Italian red available only by the bottle at $150. The diners accompanying me chose to skip the wine and ordered the Big Rock Rhinestone Cowboy, which was described to us by the server as an amber coloured lager beer. After looking at their drink menu I decided to order one of the various handcrafted cocktails available, all priced at $15. There were twelve cocktails to choose from which all sounded so marvelous that my indecisiveness kicked into high gear and I told the server that I would need a few moments before I could come to a decision. She left our table saying that she would return shortly for my drink order. It was at this point that Antler’s service momentarily waivered. Less than two minutes after our server had left, another server approached our table asking us if we were ready to order drinks. We told her that we had already been looked after and she apologized before leaving. To me, this eagerness to take a drink order appeared as a desire for the server to earn a tip rather than to please a customer. Eventually, our server returned and I ordered the foraged cedar gin sour made from cedar infused gin, lemon, simple syrup, bitters and egg whites. When my drink arrived, I took one sniff and could smell the delicate aroma of cedar. This fragrance took me back to the times when I would walk through the forest at my cottage just after it had rained and I was delighted by the taste of the drink and its artful presentation in a coupe glass. I asked for shot glasses so I could pour some of my drink for the other people in my party to taste and the server obliged my request. As we sat at our table relaxing with our drinks, we soaked in the ambiance of the restaurant itself with its dim lighting and walls painted in natural earthen hues. The seats along the wall were repurposed church pews, with the chairs across the table were wooden with wicker-like seats. Despite the small space of the restaurant, measures were taken to allow guests to enjoy a roomier feel. Along one of the walls hung a long horizontal mirror, giving the narrow restaurant space a greater sense of depth. A bar-height table was placed along the open front window, allowing the eye to merge the restaurant with the outside street. Above us on the wall hung an animal skull, likely a deer, with some green foliage sprouting from it. The whole atmosphere had a ‘woodsy’ feel to it, including the washroom which had pictures hanging on the doors of deer profiles. Both pictures were similar, and it took a few moments to be able to distinguish that the deer with the antlers symbolized the men’s washroom while the one without the antlers was the women’s. The small but clean bathrooms were located in the basement and not accessible to those with mobility issues. The ceiling height was extremely low, and any man over 5’6” would unfortunately have to duck his head in order to use the urinal. In the dining room, music was playing but could hardly be heard due to the volume of noise coming from the large party of individuals well into their fifth or sixth drinks seated at the table beside us. Our server returned and apologized for the noise, and this was greatly appreciated. She then asked if we were ready to place our order, and in our eagerness to experience Antler’s cuisine we forgot to ask her if she found out the prices of the specials and instead ordered directly off the menu. For appetizers we ordered the wild mushroom tarte Tatin ($10) which consisted of caramelized onions, foraged mushrooms, sorrel walnut pesto and puff pastry. The pastry was perfectly cooked and delicately flaky and the mushrooms were rich in taste and abundance. I could barely taste any caramelized onions, but the sorrel walnut pesto with its pleasant savoury taste and bright green hue made up for this. After seeing the table next to us order the charcuterie board, we decided to place an order for this as well. Our server informed us that it came in two sizes, with the small priced at $18 and the large at $36. We ordered the small and found that it was a perfect size to be shared between the three of us. The board arrived with all of the items presented on a long wooden plank that I wouldn’t doubt had been foraged from the woods and hand prepared for use in the restaurant. On top of the board was an arrangement of foie gras pâté, smoked duck breast, ham hock terrine, thinly sliced beef tongue and a smoked sausage. All of this was accompanied by a homemade grainy mustard and an assortment of pickled vegetables and peppers scattered throughout. Such an assortment allowed us to taste the flavours of various game meats and compare each of them by their flavours and textures. This was an exquisite platter that I would highly recommend to any diner and will easily order again on my next visit to Antler. To top it all off, our server ensured that all of the cutlery was changed and that our table was crumbed prior to our main courses arriving. I really enjoyed that these extra steps were taken so that we could fully enjoy our dinner. As for the mains, my party and I decided to select three different plates to share. All of our selected mains were served on simple but elegant white plates with portion sizes that were large enough to share. Our first choice was the rabbit pappardelle ($24) which consisted of braised rabbit meat, buttered leeks, verjus apricot preserve, parmesan cheese and sautéed greens. This was a spectacular dish. The pappardelle noodles were cooked al dente and the ratio of meat to noodles was just right. The rabbit itself was succulent and well-seasoned. It was slightly difficult to notice the apricot preserve and sautéed greens though, but the flavours of these ingredients came through in the dish itself.
Our second choice was the game burger ($18) which consisted of a burger patty of ground wild boar, bison and deer meat served on a toasted bun with hot mustard, garlic aioli, lettuce, tomato, pickles and house smoked cheddar. We asked for onions on the burger and were delighted to see that they ended up plating the burger with a copious amount of homemade onion jam rather than the traditional sliced raw onions. The burger patty was cooked to medium-well and retained a good amount of moisture. It was not at all dry like most of the wild game I have tried in the past. The burger was accompanied by a generous side of seasoned fries. I would definitely come back again simply to enjoy one of these burgers all to myself. Lastly, we also opted for the spice ash crusted rack of deer ($39) which came served on a parsnip purée topped with Swiss chard and braised deer shoulder meat. Upon the arrival of this meal we were provided with steak knives with handles resembling carved antlers, further adding to the theme of the restaurant. The deer was cooked to a medium doneness and was beautifully moist. The spice ash appeared to be a blend of various spices including cinnamon which had been burnt and ground into a powdery consistency and crusted over the deer. It was quite fragrant but managed to preserve the flavour of the meat itself. The dish was well plated and inviting with the warm colours of the accompaniments on the plate evoking images of the changing colours of leaves in fall. Lastly, our meal would not have been complete without dessert. We chose to share a peach tarte Tatin ($10) and cedar infused ice ($6) topped with a blueberry compote. The tarte was flavourful and nicely arranged, but it seemed to lack some of the uniqueness of Antler’s other dishes and came across as a pastry that could be purchased at any bakery within the city. The ice, on the other hand, was an experience in and of itself. The consistency was like that of fresh snow. The delicate taste of the cedar infusion was refreshing when paired with the blueberry compote and lingered pleasantly in the mouth. Antler could have easily taken this dish, portioned it smaller and served it as a palate cleanser between meals. Overall I have to say that I was very impressed by Antler and rate this restaurant as 3.5 toques out of 4. The food was impeccable and the atmosphere accentuated the wild cuisine. Service was better than I expected, but there is still slight room for improvement. Expect to spend between $50 to $60 per person with appetizers, desserts and drinks which is a reasonable value for your dollar given the quality of the cuisine and fresh wild regional ingredients used. After dining here, one can clearly see why this restaurant has been nominated as one of Air Canada enRoute Magazine’s best new restaurants for 2016 (Air Canada enRoute, 2016). If you want to experience Chef Hunter’s vision of what real Canadian food has to offer, take the time to eat at Antler and you will be thoroughly amazed. References Air Canada enRoute. (2016). Retrieved from http://eatandvote.com/en/ Antler. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://antlerkitchenbar.com/ ChefDB. (2015, October 23). Retrieved from http://www.chefdb.com/nm/29916/Michael-Hunter Natural Resources Canada. (2016). How much forest does Canada have? Retrieved from http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/forests/report/area/17601
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AuthorHi everyone. I'm Peter, and I have decided to follow my passion and pursue a career in cooking. I look forward to connecting with you all. Archives
February 2017
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